“Listen up guys,” bellowed Sang Min, our choir leader, who now stood in the podium, towering over all of us as he tries to get everybody’s attention. He had given us a thirty minute break and we still had twenty of it remaining but now he seems to have decided to cut the much needed break short. Although I was slightly annoyed, I was more than curious about what he had to say since he rarely interrupts us during breaks. This better be good, I thought. All of us turned our attention to him and to everybody’s surprise, he was smiling. He seldom smiled. What could have caused such a drastic change in mood? I wonder.

He cleared his throat and lifted a piece of paper, waving it in front of us. “Do any of you have any idea what this is?” Obviously not. I struggled not to roll my eyes. “No,” I answered aloud along with everyone else. His smile grew wider.

“This is our ticket to Seoul!” he exclaimed. Now that caught my attention. I have never been to Seoul. I have lived in the Philippines most of my childhood then moved here in Busan and I don’t remember ever going anywhere else because my parents didn’t allow me to. I was strictly not to go anywhere outside of Busan. I wasn’t even allowed to go out of the house and have fun except on rare occasions where I really have to like once every two years for excursions that were just within city limits, the ones we didn’t have a choice but to come with since attendance was a must. Then there’s the once in a blue moon group studies at Starbucks with groupmates who practically had to kneel and beg my parents to let me go because it was a group work and if I didn’t do it with them, they threatened that they would ask my teacher to give me the fair grade for not participating. Since my parents cared more about my grades than their rules, they would have no choice but to agree.

I let myself bask in the good news that had just been announced. A ticket to Seoul. I wanted to go to Seoul. My parents need to say yes this time. They just had to. My feet were practically itching to go somewhere that is not boring old Busan.

Sang Min started to explain the letter further and I intently listened to him, excited to pack my bags already, momentarily pushing aside the possibility that my parents might not even agree. “This is a letter from a very popular entertainment company asking our choir to sing back up for a particular group that the letter failed to mention, unfortunately. But the good news is that this performance will be aired on national television. And it will be live.” Almost everybody started talking at once, getting excited. I was no exception.

“Which company?” one of my friends asked.

Sang Min had this proud grin across his face when he answered, “YG entertainment.”

I in a breath, and so did my fellow choir members. YG Entertainment? Wow! This is big. I may not know much about kpop since I don’t ever watch television or surf the internet but I know for a fact that YG Entertainment is one of the biggest and most successful entertainment labels in our country. This. Is. Awesome.

“We have to take a trip there this weekend, though. It’s just for the whole day so you need not bring overnight bags. But we are coming home late so you need to tell your parents that important detail. We’re practicing there all day and the performance will be two weeks from now. Ready your vocal chords, children. We can’t mess up because it’s live and will be shown on national TV. Some of you might even get noticed by scouts,” he said the last part with a laugh then winked. He winked. Well that’s a first. Who would have thought that the only thing that could break that icy personality of his was a letter from YG Entertainment.

***

I was in Seoul! I didn’t want to shout even though I so wanted to because finally, I am out of that sorry little province, for the day, at least. But whatever! I will enjoy this trip because it wasn’t easy persuading my parents to let me go, oh no it was not. It literally took them three days to come up with a decision, they took one day to give me a lecture on why I was being a bad daughter which was unnecessary not to mention unfair because I have always been a stickler to the rules and then they took two days, two freaking days to debate the pros and cons of me going. There were no cons. They were being overly dramatic and overly protective, as always. But finally, last night, with faces betraying no emotion, they told me I could go but I must be careful and I must text them in between breaks so they wouldn’t have to worry about me being kidnapped or being killed. My parents have paranoia, I should get them checked.

We were already within Seoul and inside the bus that was going to take us to YG building, excited chatters could be heard from every corner. Min Ah, my best friend in the entire world, was seated beside me but we were facing each other as we ceaselessly chat about the fun we were going to have after our practice. Sang Min told us that practice was only until 5pm. After that, we were going to have free time for 3 hours before we head home.

Practice was torture, absolute torture! It wasn’t even because the song was hard or the steps were too complicated to follow. In fact, all those things were easy. What brought the torture was that devil who calls himself Sang Min. The boy was a freaking perfectionist. He kept saying that we can’t screw this up so he made us practice the same boring steps that mostly consisted of jumping around synchronized and then the backup vocals was easy because we just had to hum and sing along during the chorus with easy to remember lyrics. I ought to choke Sang Min for making us go through such torture when it would have been so easy if we were led by someone else.

When finally, the clock struck 5, Sang Min instructed us to go to the washroom to change out of our sweat soaked practice clothes. We did that and after about ten minutes, he told us we had three hours for ourselves and we had to be back by 8:30pm or the bus will leave without us. Of course, I knew that was an empty threat. He wouldn’t dare leave us behind or our parents will skin him alive.

As we walked along the corridors of YG Entertainment, I notice how nice the building really is for the first time. I mean, my god, there were big screens on one of the walls that showed pictures of all the artists and I don’t think they ever turn it off. I am not a kpop fan but I do know the names of most of the groups that were flashed – BIGBANG, 2NE1, PSY, Epik High, Lee Hi. It was an awesome building to be honest and I really tried to keep my hands off of the interesting decorations, I saw one that looked like a teddy bear and I wanted to touch it, well, I wanted to take it home with me but I’m sure that’s illegal so. Then we arrived at this part of building where on one side of the wall, huge pictures of the artists were plastered. I looked at each, smiling. At the end of the corridor, there was one that had WINNER written on it but no picture.

“Maybe this is the group we’re going to sing back up for?” Min Ah voiced out my question.

“Maybe,” I answered then I took her hand and we both walked to the exit, excited for the two hours and forty minutes of freedom that we had left.

***

A/N: No Lee Seung Hoon for the first chapter yet. *evil laugh* No worries, though. Gorgeous Lee Seung Hoon with other gorgeous WINNER members might just appear in the next chapter. ;)

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